On Oct 9, 2009, at 8:46 AM, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
I think the problem is that the branching ratio remains roughly the
same even as the energy of bombarding deuterons is reduced well
below straight fusion energy. If the concept were correct, we'd
expect higher He-4 branching with lower energies. Remember, if an
energetic deuteron penetrates the Coulomb barrier, it has lost the
energy the barrier represents, which has been transferred to the
nucleus/deuteron combination, so the point at which fusion begins
is with zero excess energy, and only the released binding energy is
there to destabilize the nucleus.
The energy of the field compression is released as heat when the
final tunneling occurs (or even if no tunneling occurs). That energy
therefore shows up in hot fusion calorimetry measurements. I think
that kind of energy doesn't show up at all in cold fusion because
there is no field compression at all due to the much further
tunneling distance of the neutral species. Any kinetic energy in
excess of that required to defeat the Coulomb barrier clearly results
in a more excited nucleus.
On Oct 9, 2009, at 6:27 AM, George Holz wrote:
Very interesting ideas Horace and Robin. I have often wondered
if conservation of momentum could play a role in requiring particle
emission
as part of the hot fusion process. A fused He4 nucleus could contain
too much angular momentum to remain stable without particle emission.
Other fusion processes might produce more He4 if the mechanism did
not involve such large ammounts of kinetic energy.
What is different about electron catalyzed fusion is the Coulomb
potential energy of the nucleus is far less, and can be momentarily
essentially zero while the electron is present. In hot fusion there
is enormous potential energy stretching the strong force bonds, due
to the two protons being present. This stress does not exist to the
same extent in an electron catalyzed fusion because the electron
neutralizes the force between the protons as long as its wavelength
is small enough. It is not essential to this point, but I think in
electron catalyzed fusion the W- is formed from the electron and
plays a significant role in extending the lifetime of the He4* as
well as increasing the probability of the fusion itself. In hot
fusion the He4* nucleus momentarily becomes highly polarized,
stretched, with the neutron tending to be in the middle, but
requiring less energy to escape radially. In cold fusion the
electron greatly reduces the Coulombic stress, thus greatly
increasing the half life for hadron escape.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
